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Tuesday With Moi

Tuesday, February 24th

These days, I get up early. The room is dark and cold; I turn on the heat, but not the lights.

It takes me three minutes to walk to The Warehouse. Four, if I’m walking slow.

I like living within walking distance of where I work, I like passing the same people every morning and giving them that I’m-walking-to-work nod as we shuffle past each other, our hands in our pockets, our chins buried in our scarves. I like having a place to go to, a key that fits in a lock, a desk that is my own.

It’s only been a week, but already I feel at home in my new space. I drink coffee and tea throughout the day, cup after cup after cup. I still work for myself, but I do it amongst others. Work feels like work again, which I like.

Our windows look out on an old graveyard and some very handsome trees. The birds sing to us throughout the day and when it’s foggy it’s almost as if we’re floating in a cloud.

The atmosphere in the office is cool and relaxed. The three of us who share the space get on with our individual projects and sometimes break to tell stories, refill our coffee cups, or ask for a reality check.

As I mentioned last week, I’ve been taking myself through my own branding method, the Brandstorm. I’m learning a lot. Soon, I’ll start sharing my experience with you.

We like to celebrate here in the office. Yesterday, our neighbor on the first floor, Paul, had a birthday. We made him a card and then gathered for cake, candles and champagne.

After a moment of birthday cheer, it was back up on the top floor for a few more hours of work.

Meanwhile, my desk at home is becoming less and less mine with each passing day. Tom is living with us right now and my at-home studio is operating as his man cave.

Last night, the Tunbridge Wells Writers gathered again. The Black Pig was only accepting cash for the evening so I stopped in a grocery store to visit an ATM. As someone who enjoys good food and eating well, I find big-box grocery stores incredibly depressing. And these flowers? If my significant other bought me any of these flowers for Valentine’s Day, I’d break up with them. Even if it wasn’t Valentine’s Day, I’d break up with them.

After the depressing grocery store incident, I enjoyed many inspiring conversations about books and writing, art and philosophy in the function room at the pub.

We had a terrific turn-out last night and it’s exciting to see the group grow and mature.

It’s funny, I’ve only been to Tunbridge Wells Writers meetings on three occasions, but already I feel like they’re mine, my people, my tribe. I enjoy the dynamic personalities in the group, the diverse writing styles represented in the group, and their willingness to open up and share their work and wisdom with others.

They’re also incredibly obliging when it comes time to leave and a lady would like a lift home.

My friend Peter often plays the role of DD and, along with his dashboard friends Bernard and Oscar, he gave a group of us a safe and warm ride home.

To close out the evening, I read a few pages of my much loved collection of short stories by Andre Dubus, which I’d meant to lend to my friend David earlier in the evening but had forgotten at home. I think Dubus is a masterful storyteller and I admire his work enormously. If you’re looking for a good read, I highly recommend any of his books though Finding a Girl in Americaand Broken Vessels are two of my favorites.

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3 thoughts on “Tuesday With Moi”

There’s nothing wrong with a cheap bunch of chrysanths. They can mean more to a pauper than a thousand roses to a millionaire. Beauty, as they say, is in the eye of the beholder. Get it out with Optrex, as Spike once said.

Oh, David. I feel this is how I start every interaction with you. Oh, David! You’re always so challenging. Do you ever get tired?

My disdain for supermarket bouquets is not so much about the price of the flowers as it is where they come from. There is no romance to a grocery store flower. A rose is a rose is a rose, but a rose that is picked fresh from a garden or bought from a florist with a loving green thumb is worth more to me than an artificially enhanced rose (or chrysanthemum, as the case may be) that is choking in a bucket of concentrated fertilizer under the glare of fluorescent lights. Call me a snob, but I want my flowers grown with love, picked locally, and, when bought, sold by someone who knows how to properly spell “chrysanthemum”.

Challenging, moi? See that at the end? That’s me smiling. Disarmingly. Charmingly. Izzit? A rose (or incorrectly spelled chrysanthemum) by any other name would smell as sweet… etc etc… Gosh, I’m tired…